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Senior huntsman guilty after feeding fox cubs to hounds

A senior huntsman has been found guilty of feeding young foxes to his hounds after covert cameras planted by anti-bloodsports activists caught him in the act.

Paul Oliver, the former master of hounds with the South Herefordshire Hunt, was convicted of four counts of animal cruelty after a judge rejected his claim that he had relocated two fox cubs in the wild.

District Judge Joanna Dickens also convicted Oliver’s partner Hannah Rose, who worked for the hunt as a kennel maid, of three counts of causing unnecessary suffering.

A seven-day trial at Birmingham Magistrates’ Court heard Oliver was caught by a hidden camera as he prepared to feed live fox cubs to his dogs in May 2016.

Opening the case at the start of the trial, prosecutor Simon Davis said: “The unnecessary suffering involved the killing of fox cubs, effectively feeding the animals… throwing the fox cubs into the kennels of the fox hounds, thereby killing them.

“Oliver and Rose were employed by the South Herefordshire Hunt, based at Wormelow, as master of hounds, and a kennel maid or groom.”

The court was told hidden motion-sensitive cameras were placed at the kennels by the Hunt Investigation Team (HIT) after it received information that animal welfare legislation had been breached.

As part of the HIT inquiry, two sites were identified where foxes were thought to have been “dug out” and police inquiries established gamekeepers had given permission for the animals to be destroyed on the land.

The court was told that a camera recorded Oliver handling foxes at the kennels and dumping the bodies of two cubs in a wheelie bin.

The footage also showed a stick with a noose attached, known as a grasper, being used by Oliver, who had previously been a senior member of Cornwall’s Western Hunt.